Page 303 of The Texas Sterling Collection
Grover walked into Bonner’s Dry Goods. “Bonner…we need to talk.” His voice boomed loud enough for the neighbors to hear.
Cornelius worked behind the counter. “What do you want, Sterling?” He didn’t look at Grover.
“First of all, here’s two bits for the glass vase you charged Felix for.” He tossed a quarter toward Cornelius from five feet away. “It’s probably worth more than the vase, but keep it. I don’t want you claiming your own son cheated you.”
“So my son sent you?” Anger showed in his voice and expression. “Didn’t he have the guts to come in and face me?”
“He doesn’t know I’m here, Bonner. And if you want to talk about no guts, you have some nerve sending that berating letter to Felix. Obviously, our last conversation meant nothing to you.”
“I’ll send whatever kind of letter I want to my son, Sterling. And as for our conversation, what I do with my son is none of your business.”
“When you abandoned Felix, it became my business.”
A crowd began to gather outside the store's front entrance. Raised voices always attracted curious onlookers.
Cornelius huffed, aimed a glare at Grover, and shouted. “Who said I abandoned my son?”
“He told us what you said, that if he left, he was never to come back. I say that was definite abandonment.” Grover roared back.
“Did you ever consider my son might be lying?”
“Felix doesn’t knowhowto lie; if he did, he probably learned it from you.”
“So you’re callingmea liar now, Sterling?” The shouting match continued.
“Let me tell you something,Bonner,if you ever send another letter like that…a letter berating your own son…the son that you never call by name, by the way…I’m coming into town, and we will take it outside. You will learn to show respect if I have to use my fists to beat it into you.” Grover stormed out of the store, ending the shouting match. The crowd scattered as he rushed past.
* * *
Cornelius moved to the door, nodding at the onlookers. He watched as Grover stomped through the gathered crowd, mounted his horse, and rode away.I have him right where I want him.Cornelius chuckled with an evil grin.We’ll see who has the last word in THIS argument.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Joey and Felix dug a shallow pit six feet from the fence outside the north corral gate. “I’ll gather kindling if you run to the outhouse and tear a couple of pages out of one of the catalogs. Then we’ll fetch logs from the woodpile.”
“Got it.” Felix ran off to bring the catalog pages.
Joey hurried to the garden area, looking for dried plants and twigs. Felix joined him, and they hauled enough kindling to start the fire. Felix carried an armful of smaller branches from the woodpile while Joey carried two good-sized logs. It was not long before they had a roaring fire.
“We’ll let this fire burn down to a bed of glowing red coals. We’ll keep adding wood to get it good and hot.” They fetched more wood and had a nice pile to feed the fire.
“Will we brand the cows out here? How come we didn’t build the fire in the corral?”
Joey raised an eyebrow. “Think about it, Felix. We don’t want a fire in an area where cattle are trapped. If they get spooked, they could step into the fire. We’ll keep the fire outside the corral and the cattle inside. We can heat the branding irons out here and brand them in there.”
“Branding irons?” Felix asked.
“Come with me.”
In the farrier stall, a trio of three-foot-long steel rods hung on one wall. At the top was a handle in the shape of a triangle. At the bottom was a metal thing attached to a U-shaped bracket. “These are our branding irons,” Joey said. “They are all the same. The ranch brand is two horseshoes that make an S.”
Joey stopped and stared at Felix. “Like those two horseshoes we found in the farrier stall the other day. I never thought about it, but those two horseshoes were hooked together like an S, only I saw them from a different angle.”
Joey grabbed Felix and hugged him, then gave him a quick kiss.
Felix panted, “Gosh…you should figure these things out more often.”
“Like I said the other day, Felix. You and me are the S in Sterling.” Joey watched Felix’s puzzled expression, then saw his eyes sparkle.
